The Hardest Lesson
by mandaree1
Summary: Marceline's first month after becoming a vampire is... difficult.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I don't own Adventure Time**

 **Title: The Hardest Lesson**

 **Summary: Marceline's first month after becoming a vampire is... difficult.**

 **...**

Marcy would just like to say that everything is going to be okay.

Well, actually, what she'd really like is for someone to _tell_ her that everything is going to be okay, but she can't afford the luxury of human company right now.

But that's okay. Everything's going to be okay. This'll all get better soon.

She'd been hopeful that the demon blood would have counteracted the turning, but she'd known deep down that it wouldn't work that way. Thanks, dad. You could've given her some advice, or some cooler powers besides soul-sucking, but _no._ You had to play it cheap. You had to leave her hanging.

Whatever. Moving on.

There's more than one way to cure a vampire... she hoped.

 _No_! Marceline shook herself. _Happy thoughts, Marcy. We'll fix this_.

Right. She didn't survive this long just to end up a stinkin' vampire. The Vampire King had another thing coming if he thought she was going to bow her head and accept this without a fight.

Okay, optimism aside, there was only two real ways to go about this. Magic... or sunlight.

(She's not above admitting that she's too scared to stake herself. Happy now, world?)

Marceline tended to avoid magic- too unstable after the bombs, if you ask her- and the sun was just beginning to rise.

She swallowed, took a deep breath, and carefully hid her guitar behind some bushes. The thought of leaving the instrument behind to the elements was more horrifying than walking into the sunlight as a newly made vampire. What? Marcy has her priorities perfectly in order, thank you very much.

"Okay, Marcy. You can do this. It's for the best." She hovered, mid-air, on the edge of the treeline, the shadows blanketing her against the newly discovered evils of the sun, of which there was plenty in the open field stretched out in front of her. "Do it for the humans."

 _Why bother_? A voice that sounded eerily like her father's said. _You're not human. You're a demon._

Not true. Half-human still counts, as far as she's concerned.

Okay, so she's a little scared of the sunlight right now, too. Which is a bit ironic, considering she used to yearn for it to escape night-time predators. (She always was technically a predator, but she sympathized more with humans more than the other half of her family). As far as Marceline is concerned, she's actually one of the nicer vampire hunters. Some of them actually tie vampires up- to trees, or to the ground, or to a religious sacrificial table of one variety or other- and leave them for the sunrise. A stake takes a second. Sunlight takes a full minute, at least.

But that's okay. She's lived a pretty good- albeit short- life. It's over. She's had her time. Insert more cliche sayings here.

Marceline slowly puts her shaking hand into the sun. It blistered and rashes almost immediately. She shrieks and yanks it back into the welcoming shadows. It heals as quickly as it was hurt. Thank goodness for sister Moon's soul.

"Ugh." Marcy puts her head in her hands with a groan. "I'm such a coward."

She can't bring herself to stick her body into the sunlight either, then. Fine. But she's _not_ going to be some crazed blood drinker. She _hunts_ crazed blood drinkers.

Magic it is, then. Retrieving her guitar- she's incredibly happy she didn't have to leave it next to a pile of ashes-, Marceline starts the long, slow float to the nearest city, and hopefully the nearest witch or wizard.

She's got time. Technically, she's got until someone stakes her. Eternity.

She's going to make this right.

It's going be okay.

 **Author's Note: Hello, new fandom!**

 **I just finished some stories, so I thought it would be safe to finally write and post this one. It's a short one- six chapters, at most- so it won't take too much time. Gotta warn ya'll- I don't know all of the lore involved with Adventure Time. If I get something wrong, don't be afraid to correct me. =)**

 **No flames! Don't like don't read! Review!**


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: I don't own Adventure Time With Finn and Jake**

 **Title: The Hardest Lesson**

 **Summary: Marceline's first month after becoming a vampire is... difficult.**

 **Warnings: Mentions of blood, but nothing too graphic.**

 **...**

 **vhjhhf \- Thanks!**

 **mr. sakata \- Yes, I have seen Stakes. It's what inspired this. =) **

**KoalSparks \- I know! I haven't really looked around, but I haven't seen any 'fics about what all happened in 'Stakes' as of yet. Maybe I'm just not looking hard enough. =)**

 **...**

As Marceline had enemies on every possible side, travel was slow-going.

Sunlight, for one thing. Marcy had never really been one for hats, but if this kept up for too much longer- _which it won't, 'cause she's going to fix this_ \- she should definitely find a few. Animals were another thing- she could shapeshift and scare them off, but that takes effort, and she's going to need all the effort she can store up for this journey.

Humans, definitely, but she's always had a love-hate relationship with humans. Being a half-demon at a time when being anything _but_ human is a big no-no doesn't exactly get her a lot of bonus points. Sometimes, if she's lucky, she'll find people like Two Bread Tom and that little girl, who don't care what you are so long as you can carry a tune and walk around in the daylight. But then there's the ones who'll attack you if your teeth are even slightly pointy. Marceline, with her infamous snaggle-teeth, can't rightly say she fits in there.

(Too many vampire souls on top of her already demon looks and blood, or so she suspects- she certainly didn't have _this_ many pointy teeth when she was a kid.)

Not to mention, humans plus new-vampire equaled the biggest concern she had about this journey; her rumbling stomach. She needed to eat. Soon.

She can't have food- she throws it right back up. She'd hoped to have made it too the city by now, but no dice.

"Ugh." She irritably curled in on herself mid-float. "Bad belly. Not gonna happen."

She likes humans, okay? There, she said it. Despite being a bit of an outsider and not having any real 'normal' friends- at least, not for long- Marcy likes people. People are human. Her mom was a human.

Man, Marceline really wished she could see her mom right now. She always took junk like this in stride.

 _Well, you can't. Deal with it._

So people are out- even the mean ones. News of a vampire hunter turned vampire spreads like wildfire these days, and Marcy isn't gullible enough to believe that this is going to stay her little secret. Hunters everywhere are sharpening their stakes, just _waiting_ for the chance to see her and attack.

Ignoring the shiver of fear that ran down her back and did a jig in her rumbling gut- _you would've done the same thing_ \- Marcy suddenly remembers that humans aren't the only ones who have blood in them.

But there's a dilemma there, as well. Marceline _likes_ animals. She's not too cold to admit to love cuddling with kitties and puppies. A cow isn't a kitty, sure, but it's still a living, breathing creature.

"Well, that settles that. No blood for you, mister." Marceline poked her stomach to make sure it got the message. She flies a few more feet before the stench of cow (a herd of which is only a few feet away, which is why she was contemplating a meal in the first place) hits her all over again and it's all she can do to stay above the ground. "Okay, okay. But just this once."

She's turning into a real, blood-drinking vampire. She hates everything. She hates The Vampire King. She hates vampires. Heck, right now, she hates herself.

But it's going to be okay. She's going to _fix_ this. All she needs is a full belly- or a slightly full belly- whichever one didn't _kill_ the poor beast- and then she'll hit the road.

For the first time in her entire life, Marcy feels her teeth grow. It doesn't hurt- not like she'd expected it too. It's kind of... tingly, almost. She's had these teeth for years now, but only now can she actually _do_ anything with them.

She's actually built for this, she realizes. Being half-demon, and, therefore, already a predator, has its uses.

If there's anything good about being in the apocalypse, she supposed, it's that nobody really owns anything anymore. She'd feel really bad if this was some random farmer's cattle. But they're not- animals of all sizes have been roaming free ever since the bombs.

Marceline pounced.

Holding the creature down with arms strengthened through shapeshifting, she sunk her teeth into the cow's throat, feeling her stomach give a lurch at the pitiful noises it was making.

The rest is... messy. A full belly does not equal a living cow, she finds out. She'll spare the details. Wiping off her mouth- which is covered in red- Marcy shudders and zooms away at top speed, grabbing her guitar as she passed by.

She'll fix this, she tells herself over and over again.

Somehow.

 **Author's Note: So, I know these chapters aren't the longest, but it's a short story with short chapters, I suppose. =) If you hadn't noticed, Marceline is slowly but surely panicking.**

 **Marcy's trying, but, judging by the vampire hysteria, nobody knows that vampires can eat just the color. But she'll find out. Obviously.**

 **No flames! Don't like don't read! Review!**


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer: I don't own Adventure Time With Finn and Jake**

 **Title: The Hardest Lesson**

 **Summary: Marceline's first month after becoming a vampire is... difficult.**

 **...**

 **fbcxhb \- Thanks. =)**

 **Stailpoos \- Well, she's as old as she was in the flashbacks of 'Stakes', which is around the physical age she's in the show.**

 **...**

Not long after the bombs, magic started to take the place of logic.

People started coming out of hiding, proclaiming themselves to be witches and wizards, capable of fixing almost every problem that came into this new world. A few even swore that it had been the bombs themselves that had tripped their powers into play. Marceline, despite being an avid believer in magic and the paranormal even back then (for obvious reasons), had scoffed at those people. Most of them were hacks, hoping to gain a position of power in this new existence that had been carved out for them. Others honestly thought they were right, but had no true powers to speak of. The remaining few that didn't fit into those categories, well... you do you, she supposed. Let them live their lives the way they wanted to.

And here she was, years later, desperate enough to seek help from the witch of trash. No, she's not kidding. A witch that lives in a garbage dump. Because this is her life now. Irony at its finest.

The tall gates don't do anything to shield the world from the massive piles of waste rising up above them. Marcy vaguely wonders how many people have been caught in a trash-avalanche over time and died. Thankfully, there's a pathway paved of cracked stone just inside, so she should be fine so long as she doesn't brush the walls.

When she goes to reach for the gate, however, two trash golems appear. Because that can apparently be a thing in this dingy city. They're still just piles of junk, only with glowing eyes, garbage spears- complete with garbage hands to hold them- and mouths filled with pointy teeth. "The witch of the trash is with a comrade in need of assistance." The one on the right hisses.

"You'll have to wait like everybody else." The one on the left agrees.

Marcy briefly considers just fighting her way in- these things would be stupidly easy to destroy- but bad first impressions don't typically equal help. And that's what she needs right now. Help.

(And food, but- _no. No food. One cow is one too many; let's not start making a name for ourselves._ )

"Uh..." She turned. There's a homeless guy there, with white hair and an even whiter beard. His clothes are in tatters, and he's caked in mud. "You waiting here?"

He nodded.

"Oh, geez. Sorry." She walks- floating would tip people off. Duh.- over so she's behind him and sits down, leaning against the grimy brick wall with him. The suns out, so she's covered from head to toe in a black cloak. She wonders if the other vampires had missed the feeling of the sun on their skin as much as she did right now.

 _Don't do it, Marcy._ She warns herself. _Don't start feeling sorry for them. It's too late for that junk now. They're all dead. You killed them_.

"Whatcha lookin' for?" The homeless man rasps. She's suddenly aware of just how _old_ this guy is. He's all knobbly limbs and wrinkles.

"Help." She answers tersely. He might not be able to stop her, but that doesn't mean there weren't others around who _can_.

He laughs, long and bitter. "Aren't we all?"

"I suppose so." Marcy idly strummed a tune. Every moment should have its own background music, after all. "You?"

He sighed. "A home. Everywhere I go, something kicks me out. I'm too old to live this way. Maybe the witch will take me in; if only to help her gather ingredients. It'd be safe in there."

Judging by what she knew about witches and wizards, Marceline doubted it. Nevertheless, she nodded. "Maybe."

He casts her a sideways glance. "What happened to you? You're so... pale."

 _Crud. He's on to me_. Marceline's fingers fumble over a note, then immediately calm themselves. She shrugs. "I was born this way."

"Human?"

"Mostly."

"Hmph." He chuckled. "A human with bite marks. Who'd've thought. I thought all those vampires had been wiped out by now."

Marcy jolted. "Who told you that?" She blurts out.

"You did- just now. I was just guessing."

She slumps, heart pounding. " _Dangit_. Just- don't freak out, okay? I'm not here to hurt anyone. I'm getting it fixed."

The man tutted. "There's no cure to vampirism. Everybody knows that."

"Well, let's hope everybody's wrong."

He opened his mouth to say something when one of the golems cleared its throat. "Next person, go ahead."

Marcy forced herself to stay calm. Magic is strong. Strong enough to rid anyone of practically anything. She'll be _fine_.

* * *

"Get _out_!"

The gates burst open as the older man is forcibly pushed out of the dump, yelping in fear. He runs away without looking back. Marceline watches him go helplessly.

The golems turn to her. "Next person, go ahead."

Slowly getting to her feet, she trudged through the gate. The doors slam shut. The trash beasts block her from escaping with a growl.

"No closer, vampire." A decript old woman came tottering up the path with a cane. Marcy is suddenly reminded of the storybooks she'd read as a child with her mom. "You don't deserve to see my lair."

"I'm not a vampire!" She shouts, then reconsiders. "I mean- I don't want to be."

"Tough toenails, little girl." She waved her cane at the bite marks scarred into her skin. "You've been bitten."

"You're a witch, aren't you? Can't you... fix it?"

"Maybe."

Marcy felt a flicker of hope. "Please?"

"No." She slammed her cane down with a satisfying _thunk_.

Her jaw dropped. The very thing keeping her- mostly- chill has just been ripped out from under her like a shag carpet. "Why not?"

"Do you think I'm an idiot?" She snarls. "I know who you are. You've killed and killed again. You don't deserve the help of magic, even if it _could_ fix you."

"Yeah, I killed _vampires_." She threw her hands into the air. "They were killing humans! Why did you _expect_ me to do?"

"The time of humans has passed, Marceline Abadeer." The witch of the trash bowed her head, eyes blazing. "We are no longer on the top of the food chain- us humans. You half-demons have it better than you suspect. Your foolish actions have completely changed the course of history. After all you've done, I think this is a suitable punishment, and my fellow sisters agree with me. No witch will ever help you, even if we _do_ find a cure."

"But I didn't _do_ anything!" She leaps forward, hoping to catch her and make her see reason, but the golems pull her away. They're surprisingly strong.

"You've done plenty. Now leave, and never return."

Marceline is thrown into the streets like a useless piece of trash.

 **Author's Note: Don't get me wrong, everybody. I love Marceline. But she kind of messed up; eliminating an entire species of magical people. Evil or not, the vampires were still creatures capable of feeling, and Marcy's starting to understand that.**

 **In 'Stakes', we can tell she's not too happy about it. She's not regretful of what she's done, per say, but she's certainly not proud of it. I wanted to showcase that.**

 **No flames! Don't like don't read! Review!**


	4. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer: I don't own Adventure Time!**

 **Title: The Hardest Lesson**

 **Summary: Marceline's first month after becoming a vampire is... difficult.**

 **...**

 **Fjkgxfj \- Thanks!**

 **...**

Marceline finds help in the form of a wizard lingering around a cave in the mountains.

"Hello, Marceline Abadeer." He kicks up his feet. It's the old man from the trash witch's place. "Remember me?"

Marcy floats there a long second, dumbfounded. "But- but you said you needed a home!"

He shrugs. "I wanted to try city living. The hag wouldn't let me."

She feels the urge to beat him up with her guitar (she'd actually been _worried_ about him) and pay for someone to fix it later, and ignores the growl of encouragement her stomach gives her.

"You know who I am, then?" She asks eventually, shifting awkwardly mid-air. "You knew who I was, the whole time?"

"Of course!" He smiles at her. The wizard is missing a few teeth, and the others are rotting as they speak. Marcy suppresses a shudder and runs her tongue along her own sets of chompers, suddenly grateful to have good dental hygiene.

"Of course." He repeats. "Everyone knows about you, Marceline. The vampire hunter turned vampire _queen_."

"I'm not the vampire queen!" She spits, horrified at the mere thought.

He raises an eyebrow. "But you were bitten by the Vampire King." He prompted her.

Marcy falters. "Yes, but-"

"Not to mention you're the last of your kind." The wizard of the mountains leaned back in his stone throne. "Face it, Abadeer. You're royalty now."

She decides it's best if she picked her battles on this one and sighed. There are worse things, she supposed, then being blue blood. She could dead. "Are you gonna kick me out, like everybody else? 'Cause I'll go quietly."

He blinked at her. "Of course not. Why would I do that?"

She felt a fluttering in her heart. "But the witch said-"

"That was the _witches_ counsel's degree." He waved his hands. "I'm a wizard."

Marceline eyes him warily. She can't tell if he's found an amazing loophole, or if he's just crazy. "The only difference is gender."

"True, but I'm one of those old school, doesn't play by the rules, types."

Hope rekindled itself in her chest, stronger than ever. "So, you'll help me, then?"

"I'd be glad to, but..." He rubbed his chin thoughtfully, scanning her. "I don't see what's wrong with you."

She's in his face in seconds, fangs bared. "Don't see? I'm a freaking _vampire_!"

He calmly raised his eyebrows. "And?"

"I need a cure. You can cure me, right?"

The wizard sighed. "Marceline, what are you _really_ afraid of?"

"Uh, being a _monster_?" She asks rhetorically. The fact that he didn't answer her question does not go unnoticed.

"You were already a half-demon before. Doesn't that count as being a monster?"

"No!" She yells, surprised by her own intensity. She'd never thought about her strange bloodline like that before. "Because I wasn't in danger of _hurting_ anyone!"

Okay, so that was a lie. She could suck pretty much any soul she wanted, consequences be darned. But it was a kill or be killed world these days anyway.

"You're still you. You're still Marceline Abadeer, daughter of the king of the underworld." He points out sensibly. "Nothing has changed."

"Except I can't eat food!" She snaps, clutching her stomach. It snarls in agreement. "I can't live off cows forever, man."

"Ah, so _that's_ it." His eyes brighten. "The draining process is what's bothering you."

"Duh." She shudders. She's fairly sure she will always regret those days when she drained animals in order to survive, even thousands of years later.

"That's an easy thing to fix. Eat Red."

Marceline's brain drew a blank. "I don't know anybody named Red."

"Just eat Red, and everything will be fine." He assured her. "Red will keep you from ever going hungry."

She blinked at him. "Uh...thanks, I guess. I'm gonna go... find Red, then."

The wizard doesn't answer. She sees herself out.

 _It's worth a try_ , she tells herself as she flies away. _One life in exchange for many is worth the years of guilt._

 _Just find Red, and it'll be over._

 _It'll be okay._

 **Author's Note: It might be wise to note that none of the vamps in the Stakes mini-series showed any interest in eating color. The animal one showed no surprise when Marcy told him he could eat it, but he didn't want to. It stands to reason that regular people wouldn't know that.**

 **Marcy doesn't hear 'eat red, the color.' She hears 'eat Red, the person.' It's just her ingrained thinking.**

 **-Mandaree1**


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